DELILAH

We all remember, don’t we, that Sampson fell in love with Delilah, who was bribed by Sampson’s enemies to find his weakness. Wary of her questions, he said first that if he were bound with bowstrings he would lose his supernatural strength. (Had you forgotten than he was into bondage?) So Delilah, clever girl that she is, waits for him to fall asleep and ties him up. He wakens and breaks the bindings. She asks again – uh, Sampson, think anything’s going on here? – and he says new ropes will do the trick. Again, she waits until he slumbers and practices a bit of bondage, and again he wakes, and breaks the ropes. Ever persistent, patient, and greedy for those thousand pieces of silver promised her by the Philistines, Delilah once again asks the question. Sampson, by now, weakened by his own love and lust for the Delilah, moves closer to the truth - that he will lose his strength if his hair, which truly is the source of his strength, is woven together. As he sleeps that night, she gives him a hair weave and ties him up, and the next morning, he awakes and unbraids his hair.

Not to be dissuaded from her potentially profitable enterprise, Delilah yet again asks Sampson the source of his strength. And poor, simple Sampson (he’s male, after all, and clearly had forgotten the story of Eve and the serpent), says that if his hair is shorn he will lose his strength. Sure enough, Delilah waits until he is asleep, and then with his head resting in her lap, she has a servant cut off his hair. His strength removed, Sampson is captured by the Philistines, turned into a slave, and, after his hair has grown back, brings down their temple and kills all those inside.

That Sampson. That Delilah. No photographers were there at the time to record the events and post them to Twitter, so artists – mostly men, of course – used their imaginations. But for the visually inclined, there are a couple of points of interest.

Point 1: Delilah is usually, though not always, shown clothed and Sampson unclothed, an early example of the CFNM (clothed female, naked man, for the fetistically illiterate) kink. (During the presumably suppressed Victorian period, women, too, were shown topless.)

Point 2: Sampson is slumbering, presumably in a post-coital state, which leads one to ask exactly when it was that Delilah cajoled his secret out of him. Just before she manipulated his secretions out, one might reasonably expect. Those among us who are moral know well that information divulged and promises made at the height of edgy arousal (promises erectus, in Latin) are less solid than the member of the person making the disclosures or vows. But some people – Delilah, you go, girl! – are a bit less moral.

Point 3: Sampson often has his head in Delilah’s lap. Let me think, where does one often see a sleeping male with his head in a woman’s lap? Why, at any event that goes on too long where a mother has brought her son! Interesting that artists associate this tender, maternal moment, normally associated with protection and comfort, with the story of a venal femme fatale, no?

Point 4: Sampson felt pretty silly when he woke up with his new hairdo. But Delilah thought it was just adorable!

Moral, for women: in his weakness there is our strength.

Moral, for men: never get an erection.

FELINE FEMME FATALES

Just for a moment, let’s go beyond the primary layer of the seeming femininity of our furry friend, the cat, and its alternate name, the pussy. Yes, I know it’s difficult, asking you to go beyond your hypothalamus and your fight, flight, fear, and fuck impulses. Let’s move up a bit into your more, well, socially informed areas of your dopamined mind, yes?

Dogs, as we all know, are loyal, easily trainable, and need to please.

Cats, on the other hand,  are fickle, independent, and indifferent. So the stereotyping says. Let’s draw a parallel. What are some of the more common complaints men have about women, aside from being late? Well, one is that they’re unpredictable (read fickle). Another is that, despite all the media blather about women needing to communicate, they actually don’t, at least when it comes to their relationships with the opposite sex. And, well, what’s to say about indifference, particularly when a man really, truly wants something? The surest route to rejection, whether at a pick up spot or in the marital bed, is for the man to go down the path of being very clear about his hypothalamine desires. Swish of the tail, as she meanders away.  Reject, reject...

It’s just sooooo much fun being a Woman!

Seemingly so warm and cuddly, and then suddenly indifferent. Changeable. Yes, men do like to reduce it to hormones and menstrual cycles, which would seem to leave them off the hook: she can’t help it, she’s on the rag. Did I ever tell you about the time a man actually had the gall to say that to me? What a lovely evening that became. I seduced him, bound him, blindfolded him and had him open his mouth wide. And, can you – I mean, really, can you? – just take one little guess about what I popped in, followed by tape across his mouth? LOL. Honestly, I’m a very caring and compassionate person. Truly. But his remark was just so distasteful to me, and it seemed an important part of his education to learn just how distasteful I found it by having him experience that sensation of distastefulness. And so, as I straddled his crotch, with him straining against the slightly undersized briefs I enjoyed seeing him in, and removed the blindfold – visual contact is very important during training – I explained that the word “rag” in that context is entirely inappropriate. And I calmly, as I shifted my hips just a bit, explained that one of the most important part of our relationship, of the dynamic between us, is that if either of us ever felt we truly knew the other person, and their responses to things, and could anticipate that, it would be lovely… but it would come to feel stale and boring quite quickly – that should he feel that I was entirely predictable, he would be terribly disappointed. And, again, I reminded him of how distasteful the word “rag” is and went on to explain that my being capricious really had nothing to do with hormones – I could just as easily manipulate him into the very position he was in right now when I wasn’t having my period—on his back and rather helpless, though I’d need to find something equally distasteful for him to chew on.

Which, of course, I later did, merely to prove the point. He wasn’t a fan of Chopped Liver. Never did acquire a taste for it, despite my effort. Oh, well.

The point here, my dears, is that being unpredictable is a source of strength, and power. Yes, it’s the nimbleness and quickness of the cat that makes them so elusive to dogs, with their hunting instinct. And, yes, it’s the hiss and the arched back that warn dogs off. But it’s the sudden, entirely unexpected and unpredicted swipe of the claws across the snout that reinforces it.

Which is why, dear reader, Batman – the strong, mysterious male and his transparent ego – can never quite subdue Catwoman, and her feral understanding of arousal, desire, and manipulation. Sure, he’s stronger. And, he has all those nifty man toys at his disposal. But Catwoman is a continually elusive being, beyond his control.  (Like the man’s penis.)

Surely you don’t need proof, but let’s just consider something. What’s the best way to minimize and control something? To mock it, of course. Back in the repressed ‘50s, Catwomen were often flat out goofy – ineffectual little things that flocked around each other to no effect, a source of amusement and naughtiness.
Example: some fun films of that era:

CAT WOMEN OF THE MOON

CAT GIRL the UK film

CAT PEOPLE. Actually a fun film.

Later, as taboos lifted, Julie Newmar in the ‘60s Batman television series was more than naughty – she was bloody well hot.

Michelle Pfeiffer was hardly buttoned down, though her Catwoman was the polar opposite of the passive, mousey designer she was in her mortal life.

 Ditto for Halley Berry in Catwoman, who literally had no need for Batman: she was her own woman.

And now comes Anne Hathaway in the next installment of the Batman movies. Dark glasses, inscrutable, impenetrable leather skin.

When it comes to men, let me ask you this. Who needs claws, when there are so many other weapons at our disposal?

The Femme Fatale

Definition of FEMME FATALE

1   a seductive woman who lures men into dangerous or compromising situations

2   a woman who attracts men by an aura of charm and mystery

Origin of FEMME FATALE

French, literally, disastrous woman

First Known Use: 1912

There are some men who just cannot resist the power of Femme Fatale.  She glides, she moves, she manipulates, she seduces, and the victim (the man) for the most part is trapped by the vision she chooses him to see.

Having been beguiled and seduced, he becomes too weak to resist, with no thought of the consquences attached.

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Film Review 1 - Matador

Matador, Directed by Pedro Almodovar

Stars: Assumpta Serna  Antonio Banderas  Nacho Martinez

Year: 1986.  Spanish with English subtitles
Purchase through  The Londoncalling Store link to Amazon on this blog.

What do a particular matador and a female sadist have in common?
Blood lust.

It isn’t everyone whose adrenal glands are so blocked that they need to ride roller coasters endlessly or sky dive without parachutes or whatever. But in this wicked and wickedly clever 1986 movie, viewers get to nuzzle up to the twisted inner workings of some characters I find quite lovely and charming.

A retired matador whose aged reflexes keep him out of the ring. And a quite fetching woman who, early on, wraps herself around her casual lover and leaves the most perfect, round lipstick imprint on the base of his neck. Having somewhat similar sympathies and a dislike of protracted agony without ecstasy, I’m quite glad that her hatpin is sharp as she imitates the ritual of life and death in the bullring with an estocada. The moment that she plunges the estoca in, the moment that he’s paralyzed, inflamed and erect and beyond reason – that final, fleeting gasp of breath – how priceless. It sends her quite over the edge.

I do admire a woman who knows what She wants.

Black comedy. Thriller.  Erotic.